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title: Working with Plugins
---                        


  
  <p>Plugins are bits of software that get loaded by Ardour in order to:</p>
<ul>
<li>Create various audio or MIDI effects
</li>
<li>Generate audio by functioning as "software instruments"
</li>
</ul>
<p>Plugins are written by 3rd parties, and Ardour supports a variety of different plugin standards:</p>
<dl class="narrower-table">
<dt>LADSPA</dt>
<dd>An early, simple, lightweight plugin API, audio effects only, plugins have no editors/GUI of their own</dd>
<dt>LV2</dt>
<dd>An extensible, full-featured plugin API, audio and MIDI, plugins can provide their own editors/GUIs</dd>
<dt>AudioUnit</dt>
<dd>OS X only, full featured, audio and MIDI, plugins can provide their own GUI</dd>
<dt>Linux VST</dt>
<dd>Plugins using Steinberg's VST plugin standard but compiled specifically for Linux</dd>
<dt>Windows VST</dt>
<dd>Plugins using Steinberg's VST plugin standard but compiled for Windows. <em>Support for this plugin format is not available in regular builds of Ardour. <a href="/working-with-plugins/windows-vst-support">Read more...</a></em>
</dd>
</dl>
<h2>Adding/Removing/Copying Plugins</h2>
<p>Within Ardour, plugins are just another type of <code>Processor</code> and so the techniques for adding/removing/copying/moving processors apply to plugins as well. These techniques are covered on the <a href="/working-with-plugins/the-processor-box">Processor Box</a> page.</p>
  





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